The invention relates to a television camera with a device for varying its viewing direction. The camera is assumed to include a cylindrical housing with a fixed lens and a camera insert containing a camera tube and, if a compact camera is involved, an electronic system as well.
In order to vary the viewing direction of such a television camera, i.e. to permit it to look in different directions, the camera has normally been mounted to a remote-controllable turning and tilting gear. Such a turning and tilting gear, however, is complicated regarding engineering and hence expensive, and since this gear is necessarily at least as large or larger than the camera, its high flow resistance has an adverse effect when being dragged under water. There are also cases where the use of a turning and tilting gear is not possible for reasons of space limitation, as when the television camera is used to examine narrow sewers in which there is no room for turning the camera to begin with.